Robot Minds and Human Ethics
Wendell Wallach
Yale University's Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics
February 5, 2008
5:30pm-7pm
Social Sciences 016
Abstract
Is it possible to design software agents and robots capable of making
moral judgments - Artificial Moral Agents (AMAs)? As the autonomy of
artificial agents increases, the challenge of ensuring that they will
not cause harm to humans becomes far more complex than the safety
concerns engineers commonly address. Can we implement moral theories
such as utilitarianism, Kant's categorical imperative, Aristotle's
virtues, the Golden Rule, or even Asimov's laws for robots in
computational systems? Which bottom-up strategies (genetic
algorithms, learning algorithms, etc.) might facilitate the
development of software agents with moral acumen? Does moral judgment
require consciousness, a sense of self, emotions, social skills, an
understanding of the semantic content of symbols and language, or that
a system be embodied in the world? Designing artificial systems
sensitive to moral considerations forces us to think deeply about
human decision making and ethics, and the ways in which we humans may
differ from the artificial entities we will create.